HPCwire: Optical Internetworking Forum Takes Aim at Next-Generation Interconnects

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January 31, 2012

Optical Internetworking Forum Takes Aim at Next-Generation Interconnects

FREMONT, Calif., Jan. 31 – The Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF) held a workshop in support of next generation interconnect technology at its Q1 member meeting last week in Cupertino, California. The goal from the workshop is to develop a Framework Document in 2012 that looks 5-8 years forward and identifies application spaces that may require industry consensus. Projects will then be developed from the Next Generation Interconnect Framework Document to look at what technology is needed to link various distances.

“Bandwidth growth has driven system requirements for scale, size, power and cost, while interconnect performance is starting to become a limiting factor in system performance,” said Steve Joiner of Finisar and a member of the OIF board. “OIF members are working together in a pre-competitive environment to consider ways of reducing the investment risk in future optical interconnect technology.”

The workshop was well attended and featured presentations by industry leaders from Brocade, Cisco, Ericsson, Finisar, Hewlett Packard, Infinera, Luxtera, Molex, TE Connectivity, Tellabs and Xilinx.

New Projects

Members of the Physical and Link Layer Working Group proposed a 28G Medium Reach (MR) Common Electrical Interface (CEI) project to support chip-to-chip interfaces. It will build on the previous 28G CEI projects, including short reach and very short reach distances, all of which enable 100G applications. A low power medium reach chip-to-chip interface is needed to enable high density and lower power line-card designs. This project will facilitate increased channel density in carrier equipment and will specify operation of 1 to n lanes of data operating at up to 28Gbps over 0 to 500mm using one connector.

A second new project titled Generation 2.0 100G long-haul DWDM Transmission Module MSA was also started in the PLL Working Group. This project will be based on technical feasibility of smaller module size with reduced power consumption for the next generation 100G MSA. Shrinking the size of the current generation 1.0 100G MSA module and lowering the power dissipation will open the possibility of having multiple modules or cards in a system rack slot, leading to higher overall capacity of the system at a lower overall cost and will enable new applications.

OIF Day at Juniper Networks

The OIF will hold “OIF Day at Juniper Networks” on February 15, 2012 as part of a continuing series of interactive and educational workshops that feature industry subject matter experts. OIF and Juniper Networks speakers will present on various topics including Packet-Optical, requirements for modules & components, and other OIF projects and directions. Through these exclusive, member-only events, the OIF strives to understand equipment vendor challenges and strategies.

“The OIF Day program is designed to allow OIF leadership to share its vision, mission and current projects with vendor and carrier companies,” said Rod Smith of TE Connectivity and the OIF’s MA&E Committee co-chair. “These events allow for an intimate working relationship between the OIF and its members and their executives.”

Election Results

Newly elected to the position of PLL Interoperability Working Group Chair for a two-year term is Ed Frlan of Gennum. Re-elected to PLL Working Group Chair for a two-year term is Dave Stauffer of IBM.

About the OIF

Launched in 1998, the OIF is the first industry group to unite representatives from data and optical networking disciplines, including many of the world's leading carriers, component manufacturers and system vendors. The OIF promotes the development and deployment of interoperable networking solutions and services through the creation of Implementation Agreements (IAs) for optical, interconnect, network processing, component and networking systems technologies. The OIF actively supports and extends the work of standards bodies and industry forums with the goal of promoting worldwide compatibility of optical internetworking products. Information on the OIF can be found at http://www.oiforum.com.

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Source: Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF)

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